Ready to Start Back Up?

Okay, it's been one week since my 10-miler that made me a little too sore in the knee. I did pool running this week and this morning I ran a mile on the Genesys track to see how things felt. I didn't have any knee pain, but I ran that mile too fast: 8:16. What am I going to do about pace? I need to slow it down.

It's snowing outside, and I don't really want to run in the light snow tomorrow. I have everything laid out for a winter run tomorrow. I will have to wait until 7am to get to the gym. Here's my current plan:

• Get up at 5:30 or so and do 3 here in the neighborhood. Go slow, see how it feels.
• Drive to the gym and swim, not pool run. See if you can do 30 min or maybe get close to the 1-mile mark swimming (33 laps).
• If you're up to it, do another 2 miles on the indoor track.
  
• That would be a total of 5 miles with 30 extra of cardio.
  

See, I am starting to get concerned about my lack of cardio for the half marathon. I think I am well into the zone where I can finish--even if I get super tired of if my knee hurts. But I still want to finish in under 2 hours.

If there is enough snow, I will run in screw shoes tomorrow. But it doesn't look that serious.

Race or No Race? / Where Do We Go From Here?

There is a 10K race next weekend; I was thinking of doing it. I bagged the last one because I didn't want to put too much stress on myself. My worry is that if I do it I might push myself too hard and get hurt. I'm also worried that I'll get discouraged. I think I should probably just stay home and try to do a long cario workout. If this hybrid run/swim thing works tomorrow, I could do that. Here's my current thinking about the rest of the pre-race schedule:

• SAT 2/6: 5M + 1M Swim (done on Sunday)
  
• SAT 2/13: 10K race?
  
• SAT 2/20: 11M LSD
  
• SAT 2/27: 8M LSD
  
• SAT 2/6: 13M LSD
  
• SAT 2/13: easy 5M
  
• SAT 2/20: HALF-MARATHON

I don't want to squander the week off I've taken by just getting hurt again. I want it to count. That's why it makes no sense to soldier on with the schedule I have and do the 11M tomorrow. I think the 5+swim will work. I will figure out if I do the 5 then swim, or if I do 3 + swim + 2.

I probably won't do the race. I could focus on running/swimming during next week. That would be good.